If João Mau-Tempo had any doubts, they end here, they all know that today is the day of his death, some of them must have guessed and then passed on the word, but in that case they’re not going to hear me groaning, so thought João Mau-Tempo and gritted his teeth, well, that again is a manner of speaking, he can’t grit the few teeth he has left, above and below, he has to grit his gums, ah, old age, old age, and yet this man is only sixty-seven, all right, he’s no stripling, the years haven’t passed in vain, but other men who are older than him are in far better health, yes, but they live far from the latifundio. Anyway, it isn’t a matter of having or not having teeth, that isn’t the point, the point is stopping the moan or groan when it’s still in its infancy and allowing the pain to grow, because that is something one cannot avoid, the point is to take away its voice, to silence it, just as he did more than twenty years ago when he was a prisoner and forced to play statues and withstand the pain in his lower back when they hit him without caring where they struck, his face is drenched in sweat, his limbs tensed, well, his arms at any rate, because he can’t feel his legs at all, indeed, at first he thinks perhaps he isn’t properly awake, but when he realizes that he is, in fact, fully conscious, he tries to move his feet, just his feet, but they don’t move either, he tries to bend his knees, but it’s useless, no one has any idea what’s going on beneath this sheet, this blanket, it’s death, death has lain down with me and no one else has noticed, somehow you imagine that death will walk in through the door or the window, but instead it’s actually here in bed with me, and how long has it been here, What time is it. This is a question that everyone asks and which always has an answer, asking what time it is distracts people from thinking about the time left or the time that has already passed, and once the question has been answered, no one thinks any more of it, it was simply the need to interrupt something or to set something else in motion again, there isn’t time now to find out, the thing we have been waiting for is here. João Mau-Tempo looks vaguely around him, there are his closest relatives and friends, three men and four women, Faustina, with the string wound around her wrist, Gracinda, who saw men killed in Montemor, Amélia, submissive, but for how much longer, Joana, ever the tough nut, Sigismundo, his comrade, Manuel, grave-faced, António, my son, ah, my son, and these are the people I am about to leave, Where’s my granddaughter, and Gracinda answers, her voice tearful, João Mau-Tempo really is about to die, She’s gone home to fetch some clothes, someone thought it best she shouldn’t be here, she’s still so young, and João Mau-Tempo feels a great relief, there’s no danger then, if they were all here that would be a bad sign, but now that his granddaughter is missing, he can’t die, he will die only when they are all here, if they knew that, they would make sure one of them was always out of the room, what could be simpler.
João Mau-Tempo uses his elbows to drag his body into an upright position, the others rush to help him, but he alone knows that this is the one way he will be able to move his legs, he is sure he will feel better sitting up, it will relieve the tightness he suddenly feels in his chest, not that he’s frightened, he knows that nothing will happen until his granddaughter returns, and then perhaps one of the others will leave the room to go and see if the rain is clearing up, it’s so hot in here, Open that door, it’s the door that opens onto the yard, it’s still raining, only in novels do the heavens open like this on these occasions, a white light enters, and suddenly João Mau-Tempo can no longer see it, and even he doesn’t know how or why.
MARIA ADELAIDE IS WORKING away from home, over toward Pegões. It’s too far for her to travel back and forth, a glance at the map will tell you that it’s at least thirty kilometers from Monte Lavre, and the work is killing, as anyone who has ever set foot in a vineyard with a hoe in his hand will tell you, Now get hoeing. And this isn’t the kind of work you can finish in a week or so, Maria Adelaide has been here for three months now, and however blue her eyes may be, that counts for nothing. She goes home only every two or three weeks, on a Sunday, and while she’s there, she rests in the way women on the latifundio have always rested, by doing some other kind of work, then it’s back to the vineyard and the hoe, under the watchful eye of some neighbors who are working there too, much to the relief of her parents, well, Manuel Espada was bound to be concerned about what his only daughter might get up to, especially coming as she does from Monte Lavre, a place rife with distrust when it comes to romantic relationships, a boy can’t be seen so much as talking to a girl, and if Maria, say, and Aurora turn out to be flighty creatures who chat away quite happily with boys and laugh at their jokes, you can be sure that they’re
